He watched her, and Dara could hear him swallowing. Could see his Adam’s apple jumping.
The space was that quiet. They were that still.
“Do you see now?” she said, her breath even, her body hot and orderly.
“I see,” the boy said. “Yes, I see.”
Dara smiled and held her pose. He kept watching.
There was something so precious, always, in the shyness of the boys.
* * *
*
It was only moments after Corbin left, Dara still gathering her water bottle, her sweater from the floor.
“Private sessions, now, eh?”
Dara turned to see Derek in the doorway, one arm holding the plastic curtain back.
“What?” Dara said. “What are you doing here? Haven’t you done enough damage for one day?”
“Came back to check on the fellas’ work,” he said. “And I couldn’t help but catch some of that. You and the boy. What is he, fifteen? Gotta feel good being around that. The way he looks at you.”
“I’m leaving,” Dara said, turning away from him, her face inexplicably hot.
But Derek merely leaned against the wall, jingling his keys, ruminating. “Hell, nothing can stop you when you’re a fifteen-year-old boy, can it? When you’re fresh and unspoiled and strong.”
This again, Dara thought. She pretended not to listen, tucking her water bottle under her arm, slinging her sweater over her shoulder. He was just trying to provoke. He wasn’t making any sense.
“And you have all this energy, so you’ll go crazy from it. Your brain running hot, your body even hotter. You just want everything.”
He stopped and looked at her. She could smell him. That sharp, clean smell. Breath mints, aftershave, that big bar of Lava soap from the powder room. And something else. Beer, and something more intimate. She stepped back.
“You must like feeling that near you,” he said.
Dara backed up, shifted, turned her torso away from him, but it didn’t matter. He still felt too close, as if his mouth were on her ear, in her head.
“Don’t worry. He likes it too,” Derek said. “He’s gonna dream about you tonight, tucked in his Spider-Man sheets. That must feel good.”
Dara turned and began walking, her body tight and not her own. In the mirror, she could see him watching her.
“I thought so,” he called out after, a soft chuckle echoing after her.
* * *
*
What is it, Dara kept asking herself. What is it we’ve let in our studio, our mother’s studio. My sister’s bed. My sister’s body. Our lives.
* * *
*
In the back office, trying to catch her breath.
She wanted to go home but couldn’t yet. Charlie was picking her up. It was too late to walk. She didn’t want to run into Derek in the parking lot, worse.
Popping the dust-brown window open, Dara took a long breath of cold, hard air.
Glancing down into the parking lot, she saw his truck, like a dark puddle.
And a figure darting quickly past the dumpsters and toward the truck.
Dara leaned out and saw her, a petite woman in a princess wool coat, poppy-red wool gloves, and enormous Jackie-O sunglasses swathing her face. She was moving slowly, furtively.
One of the mothers, Dara figured. Any of three dozen of the wealthier mothers. My Emily forgot her algebra homework. Can I check her cubby?
But this woman was walking in such a funny way, as if the pavement were covered with black ice, or fire.
Then Dara watched as she approached Derek’s truck.
What is she doing? Dara thought, watching as the woman reached out with something in her hand—an envelope, white—which she slid beneath the windshield wiper in one swift gesture.
The woman paused, then reached out again and laid her hand on the vast hood, rested her palm there. Nearly stroking it, like the belly of a large cat.
Dara felt her palms itch, her hands grow sticky.
It was only when the woman turned, removing her sunglasses and moving away, that Dara realized it was Bailey’s mom, Mrs. Bloom.
Mrs. Bloom, whom she hadn’t seen in more than a month, since the renovation began. Because, as Bailey had explained, the construction made her sick.
Mrs. Bloom, who always held her expensive handbag across her chest in the studio, shielding it from the dust, the bobby-pinned buns, twitching little girl heads all around. Mrs. Bloom, who slathered sanitizer on her hands constantly. Mrs. Bloom, who never let Bailey remove even her leg warmers in front of the boys.
But this too: Mrs. Bloom who’d dyed her hair platinum blond just like Marie.
Mrs. Bloom, Dara suddenly remembered, the very one who’d brought Derek into their lives. Her referral, her recommendation.